


A Path Out

by haniawritesthings



Series: What the World spits out- Witcher Modern AU [1]
Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: (Not between Renfri and Geralt), Abortion, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, An exploration of guilt and scars and love and growing up with trauma, Bisexual Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Bisexual Renfri | Shrike (The Witcher), Blaviken (The Witcher), Character Study, F/M, Geralt has a savior complex, Implied/Referenced Abortion, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Modern Era, Renfri does everything out of spite, Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2020-12-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:20:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28413783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haniawritesthings/pseuds/haniawritesthings
Summary: It starts like this:Geralt Rivia ends up motherless at eight, with a little brother trawling behind him and an estranged uncle taking him in.Or maybe it starts like this:Renfri is born two months early, scrawny and pale to a father already drinking himself to death and a mother who dies within a day of her birth.But really it starts like this:The town of Blaviken likes to take people and spit them back up, deciding their lives. Or in simpler words: it's a shit hole, an old mining town in the middle of nowhere in a part of England best known for it's bad weather. Fathers are perpetually drunk or absent and mothers have smiles that don't reach their eyes. Girls drop out at sixteen and are pulled into the half crumbling church with swollen bellies. Boys end up drunk, or stuck in prison, or both. The lucky ones run away or slit their wrists.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Renfri | Shrike, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Renfri | Shrike
Series: What the World spits out- Witcher Modern AU [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2081058
Comments: 5
Kudos: 15





	A Path Out

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in a hyperfocused haze on my phone last night based on some thoughts I'd had about a witcher modern au. I haven't read the books or played the games yet so this is mostly based on the show and some wiki searches.  
> It's also fairly dark and I'm going to put an extra trigger warning here just because this is not a light-hearted fic.  
> Thank you to my @alricshoehorn for beta-ing this and helping me wrangle my excessive use of commas.
> 
> Trigger Warning for:  
> Implied/referenced suicide attempts, Suicide, Alcoholism, Domestic Violence, Referenced/implied abortion, Referenced/implied sexual assault, Referenced/implied rape, Self-harm.
> 
> If any of those things are something you don't want to read about feel free to click away.  
> Listen to the companion playlist for this fic: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3CJoEX6LXA9WpCDVxfJrzL?si=XwGXi_oWT3ygCXKKL4tjKA&utm_source=copy-link

It starts like this:  
Geralt Rivia ends up motherless at eight, with a little brother trawling behind him and an estranged uncle taking him in.

Or maybe it starts like this:  
Renfri is born two months early, scrawny and pale to a father already drinking himself to death and a mother who dies within a day of her birth.

But really it starts like this:  
The town of Blaviken likes to take people and spit them back up, deciding their lives. Or in simpler words: it's a shit hole, an old mining town in the middle of nowhere in a part of England best known for it's bad weather. Fathers are perpetually drunk or absent and mothers have smiles that don't reach their eyes. Girls drop out at sixteen and are pulled into the half crumbling church with swollen bellies. Boys end up drunk, or stuck in prison, or both. The lucky ones run away or slit their wrists.

~

Geralt's mother runs away from Blaviken when she's sixteen, determined to avoid a swollen stomach of her own, and ends up in a cramped council flat in London with two sons and no husband. In Geralt's mind she is always laughing, her red hair tangled; in Geralt’s mind she is always unmoving, face down on linoleum tile, pills splayed around her. Eskel is only five and Geralt whispers to his brother that it'll be okay, that mummy is having a sleep. Eskel doesn't remember his mother beyond a vague image of a tall woman, he doesn't remember the blue pills on beige tiles.

Then, social workers are telling them about their mothers older half brother, Vesemir, still living in Blaviken, with a farm that is stopping him from sinking into poverty.  
Vesemir is no one's top choice of parent, but when Geralt considers it really, he's luckier than some. He's unmarried, doesn't hit people when he's had a few too many and has only one felony on his record. He also keeps two horses on the farm, to be occasionally rented out to lost tourists or for weddings. It takes Geralt one look at the muddy field with a battered sign proclaiming the area to be 'Kaer Moren' for him to decide he wants to learn to ride a horse more than anything in the world.

(8 months later, another social worker drops a toddler on his doorstep and informs Vesemir that he is a father and Vesemir decides that he will try and do everything he can for these boys. So perhaps Vesemir was a better choice then he first seemed .)

~

Renfri Creyden is meant to be born in July on the day of an eclipse and she thinks someone more poetic could've spun that into something beautiful. But Renfri speaks in blunt half-truths and she isn't born as the sun and moon meet, instead she's pulled out on a muggy day in May. Even two months early is too late and little Renfri manages to steal all her mother's remaining life. There’s poetry in that too somewhere.  
She'll wonder, decades after, if her father even noticed her mother's death, if he even remembered her when he married again. Renfri wishes he didn't notice her, didn't paint purple and yellow craters on her legs and arms when the pub finally kicks him out.

She'll later tell a pruney psychiatrist that she first thought about killing herself at age nine, just to watch him twitch. She lied, it was seven.

Her step-mother's breath doesn't smell of sour beer, it just spits venom that burns Renfri's skin. But, her words never touch Renfri's step brother. His eyes are always a little too bright and she wishes that she is being hit or screamed at when his roaming hands eventually reach her fast developing body.

(She won't tell the psychiatrist that, words of dismissive adults ringing in her ears. And in the version of her life that she tells him, she has no step brother)

So, Renfri develops a smart mouth and a habit of drawing ragged lines on her thighs. This body is mine she whispers as she bleeds.

~

There's only one school in Blaviken and it's practically fate when Geralt and Renfri become friends, the tall quiet boy with hair so blonde it's nearly white and the loud girl with a reputation. They spend hours sitting in the hayloft at Kaer Moren and words will tumble out of Geralt in a way that only ever happens when he's riding Roach and Renfri's grin will go from a shield to something real. Some weekends, they'll sit there until early morning as Renfri waits out the time she knows her father will be awake. It’s in this hazy time between night and morning that Geralt becomes the first person to keep secrets most residents of Blaviken have already guessed but refuse to say.

Vesemir, for his part, keeps Lambert and Eskel out of the loft and punches Renfri's father the next time he goes to the pub. It breaks his nose and stops him from hitting Renfri for a day, but the way Vesemir nods gruffly at her afterwards makes the bruises hurt a little less.

~

There is never a moment when their friendship makes the drastic shift to something more, instead it's a slow move, an expectation nearly. But, Geralt still asks when he kisses her, steady and quiet like practically everything he does.

I love you is never uttered, instead they'll drive outside the village to abandoned fields and Renfri will scream for hours. Instead, Renfri will let Geralt stutter out memories of his mother into the crook of her neck.

  
~

Renfri can see the path forward too clear, a life trapped in Blaviken and on her sixteenth birthday makes Geralt drive the miles to the abortion clinic and sit with her after it. She laughs slightly deliriously in a fast food restaurant bathroom, maybe out of relief, maybe a little out of spite for the girls who, unlike her, will be forced into wedding gowns seven months down the line .

Geralt, for his part, whispers maybes into her ear as she waits for the cramps to pass, what they'll do once they get out of Blaviken. Renfri doesn't have the heart to tell him her own escape plans, ones that don't involve good marks and scholarships.

She thinks perhaps she's therapy for his dead mother, that he believes he can save her from it all, and that makes Renfri love him more and hate him simultaneously.

~

Maybe Renfri leaves plenty of things unsaid, but so does Geralt. Isn't it easier? The way his heart speeds up when Vesemir's farm hand smiles at him is a truth too big for Blaviken, something that Geralt will only admit ten years later, in a smoky, pot infused flat.

(Renfri was also vaguely aware of that secret, but had also elected not to notice it.)

  
~

  
Renfri is seventeen when she finally decides to do it, to push vague musings into the real world and she's less afraid of ending it than she is of her lack of fear. She doesn't write a note, doesn't give away possessions, doesn't say goodbye, but does feel a little guilty about being so cruel about it. The guilt is the one thing she doesn't remember when she looks back, painted over with seething anger.

~

He finds her in her room, wrists slit and her long hair splayed and tries very hard not to think of his mother as he dials 999 and holds her and cries. Geralt's stoic facade fades quickly as he grips onto her on the ride to a&e, using her as the lifeline he wants to be for her. He tells the nurses all of it without being asked while Renfri is rushed away and lets shame engulf him as he answers questions about her family and the bruises on her legs and the cuts on her thighs. And he lets himself lean on Vesemir's shoulder, glued to a plastic chair praying to a god he barely believes in.

  
~

Renfri Creyden is born on a muggy day in May, but she doesn't die on the day of an eclipse in August. Instead, she wakes with bandaged wrists and burning rage. Renfri has spent her life running on bravery, on being a little more daring than others, but death is an easy thing to be brave about.

  
~

Geralt knows what is coming the minute he's told she'll be okay and as soon as he feels relief, he feels guilt (Geralt does remember the guilt later). He's spilled her secrets for the world to see, said the words no one has wanted to hear. They have to hold her back when he walks into the room and she lashes out at him, words jumbled and sharp.

I love you, he wants to say then, isn't that enough for you to be okay with living? He knows it's a weak excuse to try and shackle her, so he doesn't say anything at all.

Instead, he buys a bag of crisps and a trashy magazine that she loves to slag off and tells a nurse to give them to her.

Instead, he asks the social worker what will happen. (The answer is predictably foster care, Geralt and Vesemir's testimonies, along with the bruises are enough against Renfri's father, despite her silence. There's no evidence against her step brother and Geralt knows nothing will convince Renfri to speak about that either.)

Renfri does tell him one thing that isn't a barrage of insults, scrawled on a note she passes to Vesemir.

You won't be there next time.

The note is immediately given the social worker after Geralt sees it, but Renfri had predicted that anyways.

  
~

  
Renfri doesn't die on that August day, but to Geralt she might have well. A date a few months or years later might be typed on records, he thinks, but she'll have still died on the day she'd decided to. There was nobody to stop her now, and Renfri was nothing if not determined.

  
~

Geralt isn't one for day drinking, but if the end of exam season isn't a time to do so, then really, when is?

Or, at least this is what Jaskier tells him as they walk to their local pub.

"Going into a depressive coma isn't a celebration, I'm not saying we have to get pissed but a celebratory beer is in order." He counters to Geralt's mumbled refusals, the sun perfectly illuminating the abhorrently bright pattern of his button up shirt. A shirt that happened to match his sneakers."And…" Jaskier pulls open the doors to the pub. "It also means one year left of uni."

Geralt can't deny that—the thought that he's nearly done his degree in botany is a cheering one. Jaskier has already begun to make plans for life after graduation, which to Geralt's relief involves them still rooming together. They'd met on the first day of university and had struck up an unlikely friendship that mostly consisted of Jaskier rambling and Geralt nodding along. He was Geralt's best friend and the only constant in his life anymore.

The two men walk up to the bar, sitting down on wooden stools that were toeing the line between rustic and falling apart. Geralt doesn't even bother looking at the menu before calling out his order to the woman with her back to him behind the bar.

"Could I get a cider?" Next to him, Jaskier stares intently at the menu.

"What brand? We've got…" The bartender looks to face him, a hand ruffling her short hair, before stopping mid sentence. Geralt's mouth nearly falls open as the woman lets out a laugh.

"Renfri?" At this, Jaskier finally takes his eyes off the list of drinks and studies Renfri with interest.

"Fuck, what are the chances?"

"You're…" Geralt isn't quite sure how to finish the sentence, but thankfully, or not, Jaskier and Renfri speak simultaneously.

"Alive."  
At that, Renfri smirks at Geralt .

"Nice to know you tell all your new friends my sob story."

"I don't." Geralt mutters. Jaskier, to his credit, takes the situation in his stride and confidently reaches his hand across the bar.

"Jaskier Pankratz, aspiring musician and Geralt's flatmate."

Renfri doesn't shake his hand and continues to stand there.

"Renfri." She introduces herself bluntly, her gaze shifting back onto Geralt, her eyes blazing.

"Umm… Should I leave, or…?" Jaskier stands up and shuffles anxiously from foot to foot.

"Sure, pretty boy, you can take the corner table and Geralt will catch up later."

Jaskier nods slowly and gives Geralt a quick glance to mouth pretty boy before following her instructions and moving to a table in the corner of the pub. He also, not per Renfri's instructions begins very un-surreptitiously texting Geralt.

"What are you doing here?"

"In this pub? I work here. In this city? Not quite sure. And on this earth?" She grins again. "There was a change of plans."

"No shit, Renfri, you told me you were going to kill yourself. Again." Geralt isn't in the mood to play games, in fact there’s only one thing which he is in the mood for: getting high and forgetting his exam results.

"Yeah, well. They stuck me in a group home for the ones they think will off themselves. Tight rules but it wouldn't have been impossible with a bit of creativity. But I got saddled with a bitch of a roommate."

As she speaks, Renfri grabs a stool and moves to sit across from Geralt, while still not breaking eye contact. "She was a bit of an asshole but had great tits. Anyways, she was convinced I wouldn't last a year and would do it within six months.Thought I'd prove her wrong."

She shrugs at that, as if her living is just a way to win a bet. "Then I got moved to foster parents in Sussex, once they decided I wasn't a risk to myself or others etc etc. They weren't half bad, helped set me up with a flat here, I got a job and there we go, all caught up. Still want a cider?"

She gets off the stool and moves back to the drinks as if he was just another customer. Words lodge themselves in Geralt's throat and for a moment it feels like he is once again seventeen always saying the wrong things. But, he isn't, he reminds himself, he is twenty-one and he's had four years to think about that day and all that had come before it.

"I'm not sorry," He says quietly and when she turns, her face is not the hardened scowl he's expecting.

"I am. I was a kid and fucked up and convinced that killing myself was the best way to escape. I didn't want you to save me, didn't want you to fix my life and whisk me far away from Blaviken. I was so determined to get the last word, to make every choice." Renfri leans over the bar, and Geralt can see the scars on her wrists, just peeking out from the long blouse she's wearing. "We were fucked up Geralt."

"I am sorry for…"

"Trying to make me a fairytale ending?"

"For trying to decide a future for you. For trying to right every single wrong even when it wasn't my fault." He sighs. "Fuck, Renfri, I loved you, you know? Maybe I was a kid but I really loved you."

"I know." Her words come out quiet now, and Geralt looks at this woman and tries to consolidate her with the teenager he knew. He's thought about how he'd fix it if he went back, the things he would do differently. But now the woman that's haunted him is there, alive and the past isn't there to be fixed.

"Do you want to smoke a joint ? Back at my flat, after your shift I mean."

A small smile creeps onto her face, moving to a smirk.

"Sure, as long as it's the good stuff, nothing like the bullshit we used to get."

He nods and gets up from the bar to find Jaskier, who's obviously been watching the conversation.

Jaskier stands as soon as Geralt nears and raises his eyebrows. "What the fuck was that? Are you okay?"

Geralt shrugs.  
"I think it'll be okay." He says steadily and walks out of the pub, the cider he'd intended to get long forgotten.

  
~

  
It ends like this:

Renfri gets high at Geralt's flat and gets on eerily well with Jaskier, much to Geralt's chagrin, and they tip toe towards the things that they'll have to address someday.

Geralt does get that cider at the pub, and getting stoned with Renfri becomes a Saturday evening habit. And words long unspoken are slowly released, bit by bit.

Renfri and Geralt don't get back together, don't fall madly in love again (but they never really were in the first place,were they?). They laugh over awkward firsts and celebrate escaping Blaviken and accept that friendship doesn't really feel like a compromise.

It ends with two people who’ve made it out with scars, and who are still hurting, and who now get ridiculously high together every week.

It ends with a boy who still misses his mother and sometimes doesn't know how to make things right and a girl whose life has never revolved around eclipses and who has made her own choices.

It ends like this.

**Author's Note:**

> So there we go!  
> I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about Geralt and Renfri and this was my best effort to translate them along with adapting what happens in Blaviken in the show to a modern au.  
> I sort of imply it, but I see both Renfri and Geralt as bisexual.  
> I not sure where in England Blaviken would be, so imagine the muddiest part and it's about there.  
> The city Jaskier and Geralt go to uni and study in and where the last section is set, I imagine to be Brighton. Mostly because that's where I lived when I lived in the UK, and also because if I write a longer fic I actually have a vague idea of the setting.  
> You can find me on Tumblr at @haniawritesthings


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